Cacao Lagoon Kayaking

15 minutes east of La Ceiba you'll find Cacao Lagoon. It's a great place to find howler monkeys and kingfishers. It's bordered by a labrynth of mangrove forest that you can paddle into and become surrounded. Definitely worth the trip offered by Omega Tours, but make sure you get there early before the heat scares the animals into the shade.

On our way to the Cacao Lagoon, the jeep got a flat tire. It gave us a chance to snap this quick photo of the primative back benches.

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We're out in the middle of nowhere on a dirt road surrounded by farms and ranches. It's not a completely desolate road - there were a few cars and bicyclists who passed us. Miraculously, this cyclist had a cooler with a gallon of ice cream and some cones. How could we refuse? I wonder if his name was Jesus?

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You can see how bald the tire was. Luckily the spare was newly purchased. Now why didn't they change the tire when they got the thing?

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"Jesus(?)" dishes out some ice cream from his bicycle in the middle of nowhere. It's about 10:00a, so the shade is still quite tolerable.

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Wow - he's got 2 flavors in his cooler, plus orange cones!

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Hannes, our guide who happens to be from Germany, is almost finished changing the tire.

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A wasp works on its nest on a very tall cactus right next to where we got the flat.

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Whew! We made it to Cacao Lagoon. 4 kayaks are piled on top, and one of the local boys Hannes hired to help us for the day undoes the straps.

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My daughter holds half of a cacao pod. This is the large bean that we get chocolate from. The seeds/beans inside are covered with an immediately edible goey, sweet coating. The seeds themselves are too bitter to eat raw. They need a lot of sugar added to taste like the chocolate we know.

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Our 4 kayaks are unloaded and ready to be dragged to the lagoon's entry point behind us. Clouds envelope the jungle mountains in the distance. Barbed wire keeps us out of the ranch next to us. Notice the poles that support the barbed wire - they are cut from regular trees and they end up sprouting in the ground. I wonder if they'll just let them grow into huge trees, or if they prune them back?

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Packing some of our supplies in a dry sack.

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The lagoon entry point. Several very old boats await any of the ranch residents who own them. We'll be taking one of them.

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Wilson is a 13-year-old boy who our guide hired to paddle our daughter around. A 4-year-old couldn't fit with us in one of our kayaks. In fact nobody could have fit with us in our kayaks. She had a great time helping Wilson paddle.

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Hollywood with her paddle. The canoe also carried all of the lunch supplies and water bottles. If we got thirsty, all we had to do was pull up next to the canoe and get a drink.

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Kayaking on the open water of the lagoon. If you look at the purple kayak in the center wth the green paddles, you'll notice that the paddles are skewed. This makes it tough for beginners who don't realize they have to twist the oar when they alternate between left and right scoops. You end up continually turning in one direction and getting frustrated.

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The first animal we saw was a howler monkey. They are named for the noise they make, which can be heard from up to a mile away. Hannes, our guide, provoked them with his own howler monkey call. This male heard the threat and came charging out onto the branch to meet it head-on.

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Male howler monkey didn't like being disturbed.

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Male howler monkey is really ticked off. This type of picture is close to impossible to take - dark leaves and monkey against a white sky. Either you blow out the sky or the monkey is a black blob. I exposed for the sky and used photoshop to lighten all the dark spots; worked pretty well.

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Hannes leads the way past the howler monkeys. We are in a tributary that feeds the lagoon. The trees on either side of the tributary are tall enough that the branches meet overhead. The howler monkeys like that - if there's ever danger they can easily get to the other side by hopping the branches.

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Kayaking practice. He tipped his canoe on purpose a couple of times to cool off.

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Another howler monkey. This one is silent.

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These six lumps beneath this fallen log are sleeping bats. How in the world did Hannes know they were there? Easy - do this tour a few times, approach the same log and watch bats fly away when you get too close - that's how.

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Closeup of the bats. Got a much better view of bats at the Cuero y Salado refuge.

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Our daughter paddles her way through the water. We were surprised that she paddled almost the whole way, and actually seemed to be contributing to the forward motion of the canoe.

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Another howler monkey. Can you tell if this one is male or female?

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Some extremely large mangrove trees sprout roots from their branches.

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Closeup of the mangrove roots.

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Mother and baby howler monkeys

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Closeup of mother and baby howler monkeys. Whenever you get to see a baby in the wild it is a special occasion.

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When we reached the end of the lagoon we setup the picnic area just off the beach.

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Looking back from the end of the lagoon. You can see the mangrove roots reaching into the water on the right side.

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Sign telling everyone that Cacao Lagoon is a protected area.

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Our daughter squats to look at some of the thousands of small shells on the beach. The shells were all different colors.

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This grasshopper looked just like a leaf. We almost didn't see it eating our picnic lunch.

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Not sure what type of bird this is, but it picked up a fish from the lagoon and flew to the beach to eat it.

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Coming back, we just paddled straight through. We were paddling against the current, which made it surprisingly difficult to keep the kayak going straight for more than 5 paddles. Very frustrating, but we made it.

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